I instantly knew I wanted to play this weird game, so I scoured the internet for any store selling or importing these boards. Sure enough, all the sites I was able to find were either out of stock or out of business. The obvious solution then became to make my own. I drew up the basic plans, calculated some measurements and degree angles, and got my supplies.
First off I needed 3 boards of high-quality wood of specific dimensions, a ruler/T-square, protractor, dark wood stain, and a few other miscellaneous items. I cut them to the right shape, sanded them down. It's worth noting that one should never use pencil to mark certain woods. It makes a depression that requires heavy sanding to remove, making chalk the ideal marker. I wish I knew that before I marked up the 'squares,' because now the pencil marks are here to stay. Painter's tape was used to keep them separate during staining.
I picked this moment to screw up monumentally. I neglected to remember just how much stain bleeds, providing a serious setback.
Of course this prevented me fron continuing with the course of action I originally planned on. I instead elected to stain all three boards a universal dark color and paint in the squares. Fortunately, I had a large bucket of available white paint. I taped it right back up and slapped on the paint.
The paint dried very quickly in the hot sun, so I was able to do a second coat for all squares that same day. I ordered two sets of chess pieces, two black, two white. I went with a medium slate blue and painted one of the white sets.
I broke it in with a few games that went pretty well, but the rules get confusing very easily.
I like how it came out, but I'm not satisfied with it as a final project. There are a few flaws I'd rather not point out, and I would like to create a higher quality board at some point, but that's another project for another time.
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